The result in Hillsborough County showed jurors accepted the state’s abuse evidence but stopped short of convicting Tyrone Covington of first-degree murder.
TAMPA, Fla. — The prosecution of Tyrone Covington began as a first-degree murder case after an 8-year-old boy died in 2020, but it ended this month with a manslaughter conviction, an aggravated child abuse conviction and a 30-year prison sentence.
That change in legal posture is the most important fact in understanding the outcome. Prosecutors said Covington beat Josiyah Robinson, his girlfriend’s son, with a belt after the child accidentally locked keys in a car during a move. The defense fought over who inflicted the injuries and what level of intent the evidence proved. Jurors ultimately accepted that Covington caused the death, but they did not return the most serious verdict the state had sought.
Authorities first framed the case in murder terms. After the child’s mother called 911 on Oct. 22, 2020, Josiyah was taken to Brandon Hospital and then to Johns Hopkins All Children’s Hospital, where he died the next day. Medical staff documented extensive trauma, including contusions, welts, scarring and small lacerations on the lower back and rear area. An autopsy concluded that blunt force trauma caused the death and ruled it a homicide. Investigators said interviews pointed to Covington, the mother’s boyfriend, as the person who had abused the child with a belt. That led to a warrant and his arrest on Feb. 1, 2021. At that stage, officials publicly described the case as first-degree murder and aggravated child abuse, and Sheriff Chad Chronister said the violence went far beyond punishment.
But a filed charge is not a verdict, and the gap between those two things shaped the rest of the case. When trial began in January 2026, the state’s theory was that the beating followed a family move and a locked car. Courtroom reporting said the family had been hauling belongings to a new home in several loads. Late in the evening, the mother’s keys ended up inside the car, she blamed Josiyah and Covington was told to discipline him. Prosecutors said that after a locksmith opened the car, Covington whipped the child more than 100 times and forced him through pushups, sit-ups and jumping jacks. The state used those details to argue severity, duration and intent. Covington, however, denied being the killer and later tried to direct suspicion toward Josiyah’s then-14-year-old brother, a claim neither the jury nor the judge ultimately accepted.
The verdict on Jan. 29, 2026, showed how jurors sorted those competing claims. They found Covington guilty of manslaughter and aggravated child abuse. That meant they accepted criminal responsibility for the boy’s death and for the abuse itself. At the same time, they declined to convict him of first-degree murder. Public reporting on the trial did not fully spell out the jury’s internal reasoning, and jurors do not ordinarily publish a narrative explanation. So one major unknown remains the exact point at which the state’s murder theory fell short for that panel. What is clear is the consequence: the verdict reduced the maximum exposure Covington faced and set up a sentencing hearing focused less on whether he caused the death than on how much prison time those convictions required.
At sentencing on March 2, Circuit Judge Lyann Goudie denied a defense motion for a new trial and imposed 15 years for manslaughter and 30 years for aggravated child abuse, to run concurrently. Family members addressed the court, including Josiyah’s older brother, who described watching the beating and replaying it in his mind. Goudie told Covington that the child had not committed the crime and that he had. Her remarks underscored an important distinction in the case: the court’s rejection of Covington’s blame-shifting did not depend on a first-degree murder conviction. Even with the lesser verdict, the court treated the facts as a brutal and fatal assault on a child.
That is where the case now stands. A prosecution that started with the highest homicide charge available ended with a lesser homicide count, but not with acquittal. Covington remains convicted in the death of Josiyah Robinson and is set to serve a 30-year prison term unless an appeal alters the judgment.
Author note: Last updated March 30, 2026.